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At table have your eye on the simpler dishes, those which supply the maximum of nutriment and strength, and do not allow your choice to be determined by what pleases the palate or gratifies the taste. This is the deliberate preference of the fare of kings' courts to Daniel's pulse and the Baptist's locusts and wild honey. Please note, here, that there was nothing inconsistent in his taking honey.
"See here, Petro, you are ripe just in time: to-morrow is St. John the Baptist's day. Only on this one night in the year does the fern blossom. Delay not. I will await thee at midnight in the Bear's ravine." I do not believe that chickens await the hour when the woman brings their corn with as much anxiety as Petrus awaited the evening.
John the Baptist's outspoken remonstrances of course made an implacable enemy of Herodias, who did all she could to compass his death, but was unable to manage that, though she secured his imprisonment.
The viceroy himself says this important victory was due to Captain Garcia's skill and courage in storming the heights of Guaynapucará, "on Saint John the Baptist's day, in 1572." The "Hill of Roses" is indeed "a high eminence surrounded with rugged crags." The side of easiest approach is protected by a splendid, long wall, built so carefully as not to leave a single toe-hold for active besiegers.
But she suddenly remembered that it was Saint John the Baptist's day. It was not a holy day of obligation but she knew it was a feast day in French Village. There would be Mass. She should have gone, anyway. And she would hear with her own ears the things they were saying about Jeffrey Whiting.
The considerations already adduced are valid in answering this question, and others may be added. The crowd of listeners had, no doubt, many of them, been influenced by John the Baptist's fiery prophecies of the King who should come, fan in hand, to 'purge His floor, and were looking for a kingdom which was to be inaugurated by sharp separation and swift destruction.
II. AN ILLUSTRATIVE AND REMARKABLE PARALLEL. As John came in the spirit and power of Elijah, so, four hundred years ago, in the lovely city of Florence, a man was sent from God to testify against the sins of his age, who in many particulars so exactly corresponds with our Lord's forerunner that the one strongly recalls the other, and it may help us to bring the circumstances of the Baptist's ministry within a measurable distance of ourselves if we briefly compare them with the career of Girolamo Savonarola.
Burning? he sees the three children in the hot walk of the furnace. Devouring? he sees Daniel in the sealed den amidst his terrible companions. Stoning? he sees the first martyr under his heap of many gravestones. Heading? lo, there the Baptist's neck bleeding in Herodias' platter. He emulates their pain, their strength, their glory.
This was his first step on his journey to the Cross, every step of which was in fulfilment of all righteousness, in order that He might bring in everlasting righteousness. "Then he suffered Him." Some things we have to do for Christ, and some to bear for Him. Active virtues are great; but the passive ones are rarer and cost more, especially for strong natures like the Baptist's.
I declare, I feel just like Herod taking off John the Baptist's head. Well, well! it's done, and can't be helped." Just at this moment Miss Prissy heard a gentle tap at the door, and started, as if it had been a ghost, not being able to rid herself of the impression, that, somehow, she had committed a great crime, for which retribution was knocking at the door.
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